Terrorism, Violence, Crime, War and Fear
The dictionary's definition for terrorism (noun), to intimidate with the use of force and threats, to terrorize, threaten, terrify, fill with terror and intense fear.
To intimidate or cause fear to whom? To the one whom another assumed to be fearful? From its definition, we can logically infer that "terrorism", being a subjective perception of one who assumes a threat, can only exist in the mind of the same who perceives such a threat. Terrorism is not the same as violence (noun), which is defined as the use of actual or physical force to effect a physical outcome. Terrorism only exists in the perceptive reality of the fearful while violence can exist whenever one's internal physical world is confronted with actual physical force.
Parallax: Only the fearful knows an instrument of threat. A threat exist only if one knows fear. Fear being an impulsive emotion and perception of danger. It takes a person who knows fear to assume another perceives likewise. One who chose a weapon as a threat is fearful of how such weapon is perceived as being dangerous. Being fearful causes one to assume another is likewise. Hence, a "threat" is at most a presumption of perception by a mind capable of perceiving fear.
Parallax: The person whom one assumes as making a threat may not be making any. As threat is a perception and interpretation of the mind, it is subjective and dependent on the presence of fear in any mind. The person whom one assumes as making a threat may not need to make any if the intention was to inflict harm. If violence was necessary to effect an outcome, it would have been resorted to regardless of whether such was initially perceived by anyone as a threat or not. One who chose to make a threat must be most fearful of any consequences of any action, which is why a threat is resorted to instead.
Parallax: If a conflict is not resolved on a metaphysical level, it will take its natural recourse on a physical level. This is the natural balance of life. One either becomes a victim or beneficiary to the circumstances of causes and consequences. Let's dissect the analogy for instance a hostage situation. People often assumed hostage takers are threatening? If the hostage takers are threatening, they wouldn't have taken any hostages but killed people outright. They took people as hostages because they were themselves very fearful of what people may inflict on them had they not taken any. Because some people reacted to a hostage situation in such way as to cause the presumption of fear is present, hostage takers eventually decided to use the emotion of fear to their advantage. If fear was never presumed by either parties in conflict, no hostage situation would have occurred but actual violence instead.
Parallax: One's perception of fear, threat or danger does not qualify the act as terrorism. Circumstances can be perceived in many different ways. To a child, the most terrifying experience may be a visit to a physician while an adult may panic at the thought of anything resembling a weapon being directed at one. Neither scenarios posed any actual violence. The physician actually saves lives while that soever resembling a weapon may actually be a toy. Yet the perception of threat made both the circumstances of being the physician and the one pointing a toy be perceived as life threatening.
"Terrorism" is also often misconceived to connote anything one cannot comprehend a logic or reason for being. After witnessing a violent act, "WHY" would be the first question that occurs in one's mind. When people fail to comprehend a reason for any act of violence, the easiest justification would be to dismiss such as terrorism.
Metaphysical causes for violence, crime and war. In any system, there exists a counter system. Since there is no absolute certainty of infallibility for whatsoever, the system of a life we employ as our perceptive realities may be favorable to one while oppressive to another. Systems often counteract, equalize and balance itself through external metaphysics or internal physics. Metaphysics provide the causes for each physical consequence. When the metaphysical causes or reasons does not justify a physical consequence and outcome, dissent, issues and conflicts arise to counteract the imbalance. Conflicts which were not resolved at the metaphysical or reason stage may eventually transcend to a physical or consequential stage. The pragmatic maxim provides that whatever is necessary for an outcome is consequential to its cause.
Whatever is not balance will balance itself, either through metaphysical causes or physical resolution. If physical resolution is resorted to, we can define such acts as violence or war but not necessarily "terrorism". If such acts are born of greed or economic necessity, it may be a crime but not necessarily "terrorism".
By its definition, the word "terrorism" is an act which can only be qualified by intent. Terrorism cannot be qualified or proven based on one's perception of fear, danger or threat. By definition, to qualify an act as "terrorism", one must first be able to prove the primary intent of the act was to sow terror and second, the presumption of fearful people is present. An act of violence or war against another may not have any intent to "terrorize" than inflict actual damage. Because its consequences may be perceived as threatening to the agonized, such act is often misconstrued as terrorism.
Let's dissect the analogy of bombings for instance. The only thing that can be qualified and proven by such act is that of violence resulting to destruction and death. Fear and terror perceived by one as an after effect or consequence of destruction had no bearing on the bombers' primary intention, which is to kill and destroy. Hence such is clearly an act of war. The inability to comprehend intent does not qualify the presumptuousness of another. What one does or not comprehend doesn't make an other's intent differ. Had the bombers' intent been to "terrorize" as what people were alluding to, they would have used a dummy, not a real bomb followed by several others. Hence, the logical descriptive term for bombers should be "enemy" rather than "terrorist". The misconception of these two words cause confusion in the mind and eventual detachment from reality. Confusion and detachment can lead to apprehension. Ironically, whoever wants people to misconceive and misinterpret must be the real terrorist amongst all.
In summary, "terrorism" is a word people often abused and misused, to vindicate oneself and persist in a conflicting state of lapses and misjudgements, presumably for the welfare of humanity in general.
